Posts by Dan 55

Re: Is C++ becoming too large and complex?

C didn't even exist in the 1960s and neither did Pascal! That link was from the 1980s when both were about a decade old and people had worked out each language's weaknesses.

Anyway, I should move on, as you say. Do keep carrying on talking about the 1950s.

Re: "Competent, core language"

None of the languages you cite are getting traction in the commercial world and you miss all the langagues that provide real competition like Java or are up-and-coming like Go and Rust. But apparently I am wrong.

Re: 'you still can't write something like an OS with them'

If it's standard Pascal then units aren't compiled separately but end up in one monolithic executable. You might be looking for library (non-standard).

Re: Is C++ becoming too large and complex?

Pascal came up because you were saying the popularity of C was misplaced. I was trying to get the point across that there was no contemporary competition to C which could do the things C could do. At that time, Pascal was C's supposed competition.

I don't know, if you don't like C++ and even don't like C but cite languages like ALGOL and Pascal in other posts, it seems it's not me who's refusing to move on.

Re: Is C++ becoming too large and complex?

Nope, I was talking just about Pascal.

Apple moved away from a toy language as the moved away from a toy operating system.

The problem is that there is no standard in commercial Pascal implementations, each one solved the many and varied problems in their own way meaning there was no portability, while the language itself remained pristine and unsullied and unusable so the academics were happy.

Meanwhile, in the real world, C and C++ evolved, and all compilers supported the changes (even VC, eventually).

Re: Really?

"auto a1{0,1};" won't compile from C++17 onwards. AC was asking how auto helps.

Re: Is C++ becoming too large and complex?

Pascal could manage a glorified bootstrapper with a GUI, which I guess is an improvement in MS-DOS, but Apple moved away from Pascal with the move towards co-operative multitasking and PowerPC.

See also Why Pascal is Not My Favorite Programming Language.

Re: The old problem of the programmer perisope view of the world..

Er, no, my experience of MI is in the commercial world. And it compiled and ran and passed QA and was accepted by the customer and everything.

Re: C++ – never classy

You seem to have searched for "things I don't like about C" in Google and pasted a bunch of links.

Re: Really?

It wouldn't, because a1 wouldn't compile. Your point being that auto is terrible because you can't sprinkle it everywhere or something?

Re: "Competent, core language"

Twas my autocorrect, but Burrows as in head in the stand might be appropriate.

Pascal is nice to teach programming with, but can't be used in the real world. Delphi and Lazarus are not standard Pascal because standard Pascal is too limiting, but even so you still can't write something like an OS with them.

Seriously not getting your complaint about C/C++ being old, stuck in a quagmire, etc... and then going on to quote languages which are fossilised or only of interest inside academia.

Re: The old problem of the programmer perisope view of the world..

If you have learned OOP in a proper OO language like Smalltalk or Java

I stopped there. Multiple inheritence is too scary I take it? Fine, but then don't talk about proper OOP.

Re: C++ – never classy

Can't see why. They both express concepts and change to express new concepts... or die from lack of use.

Re: "Competent, core language"

By Burrows system languages you mean ALGOL. And then you complain that C++ is old and tired.

Re: Is C++ becoming too large and complex?

Well, you've missed what auto is for.

Re: Is C++ becoming too large and complex?

As far as I can tell there was no other language around which was as popular as C was which could cope with software of operating-system level complexity, certainly none of the examples of languages given here. So C was probably the best place for C++ to start.

If you're saying the popularity of C was/is misplaced then you don't understand why C was and is popular. You still can't write operating systems in Pascal, at one time that supposedly was a contender for C's crown.

C++ built upon this foundation. It was not perfect, but it got results, exactly like C, which is why C and C++ are popular. Other languages might have feature A, B, and C but not all of them. If they're useful then C++ will incorporate them and carry on. The other languages certainly won't be in any hurry to incorporate each other's features, let alone features from C++.

C++ does not aspire to be some perfect representation of an object-oriented language. There is no perfect language, not C++ and not the rest. The others either 1) have barely managed to get out the academic stage, trapped in constant debates about the best way to do things with a moribund user base or 2) are scripted or need a JIT VM or 3) are owned by some megacorp. C++ is the only language which is not owned by anyone, compiles into object code, and has new features which the user base are pushing for. The ones that are getting somewhere (Go, Rust) are getting somewhere due to their similarity to C++.

Re: Is C++ becoming too large and complex?

So you would rather C++ be unchanging, forever, born in a state of perfection meaning no changes are necessary to the language in the decades ahead to meet programmers' needs?

All you need to do is look at the relative numbers of users of Eiffel, Smalltalk, Simula 67, or whatever other perfect language you care to mention to see how well that would work out. C++ would turn into one of those languages or another version of Objective C - nobody uses them unless they're forced to.

Re: Object

On the other hand I saw Z in uni. And never again.

You don't need header files meaning you don't need to include the same file multiple times from different places in the code, you don't have to worry about include order, and you don't need to mess around with guard defines so headers can be included multiple times.

Re: C++ – never classy

Then again, a language that doesn't change is dead, that goes for both computing and spoken languages.

Re: Is C++ becoming too large and complex?

You don't have to remember all the language, you can forget the bits which are superseded by something newer, better, and/or simpler. E.g. C++11 really simplified a load of stuff.

Re: This will make the soon-to-be-Kickstarted mini Amiga easier

You could emulate more systems by swapping the SD card or running them on the Linux side, and you'd still have the nice case.

Does anyone in the EU currently trade with a third country where there are absolutely no trade agreements between the two (see the "Trading with..." heading on each country or region page)? Perhaps they could get by by using North Korea's country code for exports to the UK in the meantime.

If something like that doesn't appear in the opinion columns in the British right-wing comics in the second week of next year, I'll lie down in front of a bulldozer and eat my ID card.

Re: I am sure Boris will be on holiday when the $h1T hits the fan

"But Boris Johnson said the UK was "ready for any eventuality" after the transition period."

Spot the difference:

Rowley Birkin QC

Johnson talking Customs and logistics, his claims in that video about GB-NI trade were debunked in less than a day.

Re: Muppet politics

So much whataboutery, so little time. It's not a chicken and egg problem, there is a timeline.

1) Police kill George Floyd.

2) Peaceful protest (a constitutional right).

3) Protests about police brutality are met with wave of police brutality across US

4) Trump sends in the stormtroopers, first to Portland in Oregon, later to other state capitals.

5) Jacob Blake shot in the back seven times while going about his business and paralysed. More protests.

6) White 17-year-old child with an assault rifle forming part of the so-called militia allowed to kill two black people and walk through police lines.

Various appearances by Trump throughout all this calculated to enrage matters even more, and sending in his federal goon squad if he thinks he can get away with it.

Those are the objective facts.

Obviously the playbook is fomenting division, blaming everything that can be blamed on black people as a whole if it a black person is accused of something, forgiving everything that can be forgiven if it was a white person who did something, and sending in the stormtroopers on every excuse. That's his election plan.

Quite obviously they are not all as bad as each other, because Trump is objectively worse and America has a big policing problem which has been allowed to fester by Trump. He's not responsible for it, but he sure as hell isn't doing anything about it.

Re: Muppet politics

All of the candidates are responsable

Very fine people on both sides?